Mum Morgan Joins was left feeling guilty for months after the birth of her son, after she overheard a nurse call her “lazy” for having a caesarean-section while her newborn was put on oxygen
A mum was left traumatised for months after giving birth in a scandal-hit maternity unit.
Morgan Joins, 28, was advised to have a caesarean-section when giving birth to her son Jensen, after developing complications during her last labour.
Shortly after baby Jensen was delivered at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital, he was rushed to the high dependency unit and put on oxygen. But as she lay in the maternity ward sick with worry, Morgan claimed she overheard a nurse blaming the tot’s illness on her decision to have a surgical birth.
She told the Mirror: “I’d just had major surgery and my son was on oxygen. The nurse in charge of my care was talking to colleagues outside the curtains and said: ‘Her poor son is on the high dependency unit because she was too lazy to push’. I didn’t choose to have a caesarean, I was advised.
“Her comment really stuck with me and I carried that trauma and guilt for a long time – I thought it was my fault my son was unwell. It took a huge mental toll, and it pushed my recovery back a long time.”
Morgan, a stay-at-home mum, shared her story hours after new health secretary Yvette Cooper vowed to overhaul NHS maternity care. Cooper is pulling together a task force with five key aims and wants to set national care standards to avoid new mums facing a postcode lottery.
She also hoped to tackle racial inequalities for Black and Asian women, make patient experience part of the measurement of standards, and have targets to give early warning of underperformance before a major scandal develops.
She told the Guardian: “I would worry about any mum feeling pressurised that there is somehow a kind of an ideal birth experience to live up to when it’s always different in every case, and you have to follow the evidence, you have to have informed choice.”
Morgan welcomed the announcement, but feared a cultural shift wouldn’t come easily. “I have concerns as I don’t think it’s anything to do with how they [maternity staff] are trained,” she said.
“It has a lot to do with individual opinions and beliefs, so there will likely always be some nurses, midwives, nurses and doctors who will carry the belief that c-sections are the easy way out. As a patient, we want these changes, but will maternity staff be on board with it?”
Oxford University’s John Radcliffe Hospital, where Morgan gave birth to both her children, has faced intense scrutiny following investigations revealing preventable baby deaths, systemic failings, ignored maternal concerns and a defensive institutional culture. And a landmark independent review led by senior midwife Donna Ockenden into the Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust revealed in June how over 500 mums and babies suffered potentially avoidable harm or died due to deep-rooted, systemic failings.
Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust was approached for comment.